


Eyes of Ice

by Zeddembi



Series: Cold As The Grave [1]
Category: As It Is (Band)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Ghosts, M/M, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-06
Updated: 2019-12-13
Packaged: 2020-04-11 17:22:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 18
Words: 10,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19114282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zeddembi/pseuds/Zeddembi
Summary: Ronnie lives a peaceful life in his woodland cabin. Peaceful aside from the yearly Horrifying and Mysterious Animal Attacks, but he tries not to let those get to him. They were probably rabid wolves or something, right? This poor stranger he found injured and alone one night couldn't know anything about it, right?





	1. Trapped

**Author's Note:**

> I came up with this this morning and it was gonna be two chapters at most, but my imagination went totally 'round the bend. I guess we'll see how it goes from here.

It was hard to navigate the treacherous forest floor in the dark, but the screaming spurred Ronnie on. He hoped to god that whoever it was hadn’t met the animal that had been killing hunters every winter for years. He felt sick as the screams died down, but kept up his pace. Even if he didn’t make it in time to save the victim, he had to try to kill whatever had done it.

He slowed as he came close to the place he thought the screams had come from, listening with bated breath. He was relieved to hear someone sobbing, the sounds of tearing flesh thankfully absent. 

The trees thinned into a small moonlit clearing, a figure curled up on the ground in the middle. 

Whoever it was looked up at him. “Oh my god, you have to help me!” he pleaded.

Ronnie aimed his rifle at the trees around them, searching for predators. He didn’t know how many wolves he could beat back alone. He didn’t have enough ammo for a whole pack. As he approached, he noticed his outfit, a simple pale dress that didn’t cover his shoulders and barely came down to his knees. It looked better suited for summer than late winter. His eyes fell on the bear trap around the stranger’s leg, dark blood staining the snow around them. Shit. 

“Uh, okay, hold on.” He crouched beside them and put his gun down within reach, examining the trap. It seemed to have nails welded onto the jaws. 

Ronnie shoved all questions aside to focus. 

It was hard to disable the trap when it was so slippery with blood and apparently modified to injure its captive as much as possible. The task was harder still when the stranger buried their face into his neck and sobbed in pain as he worked. Ronnie didn’t try to push them away. They must’ve been terrified and so, so cold.

Forcing the springs down, he wrenched the trap open with a boot and urged them to pull their leg out. Where were their shoes?

He slowly let the trap shut, then slipped his pack from his shoulders and took out a bandage roll. “What’s your name?” he asked, hoping to somewhat distract the stranger from the pain as he wrapped up their leg. 

“Patty,” he croaked weakly into Ronnie’s chest. 

“I’m Ronnie.” 

He tied the bandage and took off his coat, pulling Patty off to help him into it. A breeze chilled him, even through the layers he was still wearing. 

“Can you stand for me?”

He helped Patty struggle to his feet, holding him close and keeping his gun ready as they followed Ronnie’s tracks back into the trees. 

“I’ll take you to my place. It’s too dangerous to drive right now, but you can spend the night in front of the fire and I’ll get you to a hospital tomorrow.” 

Patty nodded, shivering and grasping at him as he limped. “Thank you.” 

Ronnie rubbed his shoulder. “How did you get out here?” 

“I got lost.” 

It wasn’t a satisfying answer, but Ronnie let the conversation die and listened for the sounds of curious wildlife. Hopefully the wolves weren’t feeling too confident tonight. 

They weren’t too far from the road, fortunately. Ronnie wondered what kind of idiot asshole had set bear traps where anyone could accidentally step in them. Some kind of sadist, judging by the added spikes. He made a mental note of the location. Tomorrow he’d scour the area for more and take the one Patty had triggered into town. Maybe someone would recognise it. 

It was a relief when they made it to Ronnie’s cabin with no other problems. He set Patty down on the couch in front of the fire, grabbing spare blankets from the linen cupboard. If Patty wasn’t hypothermic already he had to be close to it. How long had he been out there in that thin dress? 

He wanted to stay up with Patty and keep checking up to make sure he didn’t stop breathing during the night, but Ronnie couldn’t keep his eyes open. He woke to find himself slumped against the couch, the fire low and Patty gone. He hadn’t even changed out of his clothes. 

Ronnie checked every room, but found nothing. Panicked, he grabbed his coat and gun and hurried outside. When had Patty left? There was no way he could survive out here, he needed a doctor.

“Patty?” Ronnie called. 

No reply. 

A single set of footprints headed from the front door down the driveway. He followed them until his brain stopped racing and he realised they were leading the way he’d come with Patty last night. As sense returned to him, he had a strange thought and bent down to examine the prints. 

He cursed himself. They were _his_ footprints and they were pointing back to his cabin. Patty’s were nowhere to be seen. 

Frowning, Ronnie continued to follow the trail. Patty had been right beside him for the whole journey. There should have been another set of prints. 

The small clearing looked completely different in the morning light. Peaceful, rather than threateningly still. Maybe the total absence of the bear trap and any trace of blood had something to do with it. 

Had he hallucinated everything?


	2. Nervous

_“See ya soon!”_

_“When’s she coming?” Talia asked as Patty hung up._

_“Around six thirty.” Patty went to the bedroom mirror, straightening out his dress a bit. He’d bought it a few months ago and tried it on a few times, but hadn’t really felt like wearing it out until now. Tonight he was determined to be at his cutest. “Could you zip me up?”_

_Talia helped him zip up the back. “Think you’ll go back to her place?”_

_Patty blushed and grinned. “We’ll see how it goes! I’ll call if I do though.”_

_“Cool. Shoes?” She held up the flats he’d gotten to match the pale dress._

_Patty shook his head. “Later. I’ve still got like an hour to kill.”_

_Talia flopped down on his bed. “So are you guys official yet?”_

_“I don’t know,” he said honestly, sitting beside her._

_Talia lightly punched him. “How many dates have you been on again?”_

_“I don’t wanna assume!”_

_“This will be five,” Talia reminded him, “Even if you’re not a thing, I’m pretty sure she’s interested in making you one.”_

_Patty smiled. “You think so?”_

_Talia gave him a disbelieving look. “You’re a dumbass, dude.”_


	3. Tense

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm thinking I'll try to keep chapters short for this fic. Hopefully I'll be able to get more out faster that way.

He was vigilant about his state of mind for a while after that night, expecting to notice weird dreams or blanks in his memory or _something._ He’d felt sick when he heard on the news that the animal had killed someone, but he was relieved when it turned out to be game hunter called Bob Jackson. He mentally kicked himself for being insensitive. He _knew_ Jackson. Maybe all the solitude and worry was finally getting to him. 

“Maybe it was your subconscious trying to live out your fantasy of rescuing and getting it on with a pretty stranger,” Foley teasingly suggested one night when they were out at a bar with Ben and Ali, “Did you fuck?” 

The conversation had turned to discussing weird dreams they’d had. That was all Ronnie could make of that night now. A weird dream. 

He shoved at Foley playfully. “We didn’t fuck, asshole. I was kinda busy worrying he’d die of hypothermia.” He sat back. “God, it felt real.” 

“You said you thought it was the animal at first?” Ben asked. No need to clarify _which_ animal anymore. Even if some still thought it was a weird myth, everyone had heard of the victims, one every winter for years, found painted to the trees and snow. There were never more than bloody bones left to bury. 

“Yeah, before I found him I assumed it was attacking him.” 

“I had a dream about finding it once,” Ali said. 

“The animal?” 

Ali nodded.

“Me too,” Ben said. 

“Really?” Ronnie wondered if everyone had nightmares about it occasionally. It had certainly made winter a scary time for everyone living out of town. 

“What kind of animal was it?” Ali asked him, “It looked like a huge white bear in my dream. It was a bit around the time Jones was killed, remember that? He’d bragged about a white bear pelt he got the summer before.” 

Everyone nodded. 

“Anyway, I found the bear and it killed me. I was a mess for the rest of the day, it was horrible.”

“Did anyone else think that pelt looked kinda small?” Ronnie asked. 

“Definitely,” Foley said, “Had to be pretty young when he killed it.” 

“Probably didn’t want anyone else to get it first,” Ronnie guessed. He looked at Ben. “What about your dream?”

“It was a stag in mine,” Ben said, “Fuck-off massive antlers. It had teeth like a wolf, though. It gored me and then ripped me apart. Actually...” His brow furrowed. “I think that was around the time the animal got Thomson. He used to love showing off the antlers from his kills.” 

“Woah,” Foley said, awed but grinning, “That actually _is_ kind of spooky. There are some serious parallels there.” His smile faded. “Shit.”

“What’s up?” Ronnie asked. 

“Well...it might sound stupid.” 

“Well you _have_ to tell us now,” Ben said.

“Um...I had a dream where I was swimming in the lake. Big Red grabbed my leg and pulled me under.”

Ronnie remembered Big Red. He had been a huge fish that lived in the lake until a few years ago. In reality, he had never attacked anyone. He was actually a pretty popular attraction. 

“There was a lot of blood in the water,” Foley continued, “He kept biting off pieces of me and pulling me down. Fucked me up for about a week.”

“It wasn’t around the time…” Ronnie didn’t need to finish his question. 

Foley nodded. “The same winter the guy who killed him was found.” 

They all became silent. Odd nightmares were common around here, but some coincidences just didn’t sit well. 

“Welp. That’s put me off meat for the rest of my life,” Ben announced.

“You’re _vegan,_ ” Ronnie said. 

“Yep. And now I see that I’ve had it right all along. You guys are fucked.” 

The tension disappeared as the conversation lightened and Ronnie told himself he was overthinking it all.


	4. Happy

_Mom gasped when Patty came in. “Oh! You look so cute!”_

_Patty laughed, doing a small spin. “Think she’ll like it?”_

_“I can’t wait for her to see you! I call dibs on opening the door for her!”_

_“‘Dibs,’ mom?” Talia teased._

_“I’m just saying,” she defended, “I need to make sure she appreciates my handsome young man enough.” She hugged Patty tightly._

_They pulled apart as Dad came in. “How long will you be out?” he asked._

_Patty tilted his head. “I don’t know, why?”_

_“The snow’s pretty deep. If any more comes down, it might be best for you to stay in the city for the night. I don't want you driving in it when you're tired.”_

_“_ Ooh! _” Talia grinned wickedly._

_Patty gave her a playful shove. “Shut up!”_

_“_ Anything _could happen!” she said slyly, pushing him back, “A whole night with just you and her!_ Gross! _”_

_Mom shook her head, smiling. “How much money do you have on your card?”_

_“Uh...a few hundred?”_

_She gave him a pointed look. “Enough for an emergency?”_

_“Definitely enough for a few nights.” He looked back at Talia. “I can’t wait to use it to book two rooms on opposite sides of the hotel with her!”_

_Talia poked her tongue at him._

_“You should go up and show grandma your outfit,” Mom suggested, “She’ll love it!”_


	5. Aware

Ronnie successfully kept Patty and his friends’ nightmares in a drawer far at the back of his mind for most of the year, until he and Foley were out in the woods and heard someone screaming the following winter. 

They’d been out on Foley’s property, looking at a fallen log that would need to be moved, when the piercing cries had reached them. Foley had wasted no time in making for the sounds, but Ronnie grabbed his rifle from his truck first, apprehension nagging at him as he followed. 

It had been a while, but he couldn’t deny the familiarity of the cries. At least it was day this time. 

He caught up to Foley quickly, putting a hand to slow him so he could lead. The pleas for help grew louder and louder until they came to a clearing and Ronnie hoped he was wrong. Gun at the ready, Ronnie led the way and, sure enough, found the same white-haired man in the same dress, the same leg stuck in another fucking bear trap. 

Patty caught his eye and seemed to hesitate for a moment before resuming his routine. “Please help me, I’m stuck! It hurts so much!” 

Ronnie kept his rifle pointed at him as he approached. “Get lost again?” 

“Ronnie, what the _fuck._ ” Foley looked as if he wanted to put himself between them, but he eyed the gun and kept out of its way. “He needs help.” 

“This is him.” Ronnie stopped several feet away from Patty. “The guy from the dream I told you about, remember?” 

“With the dress,” Foley realised, “Oh my god, did you see the _future?_ ”

Ronnie gave Foley a disbelieving look. “No, it wasn’t a dream. This proves it was _real._ ”

“That’s ridiculous,” Foley argued. 

Patty sagged in annoyance. “Fuck you.” There was no trace of pain or fear in his tone. “This is the second time you’ve got in the way of one of my hunts.” 

Awful realisation hit. 

“Are you the one that’s been killing people?” Ronnie demanded. 

“Lots of things kill people here,” he answered. 

“The animal. The one we’ve been looking for for _years._ ”

“Ronnie, that’s _mad,_ ” Foley said, “A human couldn’t do that.” 

The bear trap crumbled away from Patty’s leg, turning into snow.

Foley stepped back. “Oh, god.”

Ronnie kept Patty’s head in his sights as he stood, brushing his dress off. “Are you the animal?”

Patty gave him a calculating look. “Maybe I am.” 

“Why didn’t you kill me, then?” Ronnie asked, “I fell for your trap and you didn’t touch me.” 

Patty walked around them to the edge of the clearing, unbothered by the rifle. “I only care about trophy hunters.”

Ronnie followed, Foley close behind him. “I kill animals too.” He wondered why he was admitting that. Patty was clearly okay with, and very good at, violent murder. 

“You’re more moral about it. You eat what you kill, you make sell whatever you can’t use to people who make new stuff from them and you make sure no part of the animal is wasted. You don’t turn them into tasteless ornaments. If I targeted everything that killed to live the wolf population out here would be fucked.”

Ronnie lowered his gun to better see the ground as he walked. “How do you know all that about me?” 

Despite his bare feet, Patty seemed to have no trouble with all the wayward rocks and fallen branches hidden under the snow. “I asked around.”

“Asked who?” 

“A lot of things live in the woods, you know.” 

“So...what are you? Some kind of forest guardian?” 

“Just a ghost.” 

Ronnie didn’t know why his chest tightened. 

“Hang on,” Foley cut in, “So you’re…”

“I’ve been dead for years,” Patty confirmed. 

“Does everyone who dies out here become like you?” Foley asked, “Vengeful spirits in pretty dresses?” 

“Nah. If the forest doesn’t like you, you get a much worse treatment.” 

Ronnie shivered. 

“And this is just what I was wearing when I died,” he added, looking down at his dress, “Total coincidence that it fits the aesthetic. Do you like it?” 

“Wait, wait, wait,” Ronnie said, “ _Worse_ treatment.” 

Patty smiled back at him. “Don’t worry, you guys are okay. For now, at least. It’s the people I’m actually hunting who have to worry.” 

“Who are you hunting now?” Foley asked. 

“None of your business.” 

“Please tell us?”

Patty gave him a look. “You’ll try to warn them. I know what you guys are like, remember?” 

Something clicked. “Were you trying to lure in Bob Jackson?” Ronnie demanded, “That night I found you?” 

“Yeah. He was deaf as shit though. Took a few tries.” 

“Hey, we _knew_ him,” Ronnie said. 

“Did you know about the wolves he killed for fun?” Patty shot back, “The baiting and trapping and skinning and leaving the rest to rot?”

Ronnie hesitated. “No.” 

“The guy I’m after now is a fucking sadist.” Patty told them, “Someone’s gotta do something about it and it might as well be me.”

“Why? Because _you’re_ a sadist too?” he accused. 

“Because I actually give a shit,” Patty bit, turning to face them. The hurt in his eyes surprised Ronnie. “You guys can just look the other way when someone does something you don’t like, but I have to live with all of it. I feel the trees mourn for _years_ every time a human decides they haven’t taken enough yet.” As he spoke, Patty's face changed, his lips turning blue as his eyes grew pale and sank into their sockets. 

Ronnie looked down. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realise.” 

“There’s a lot you don’t realise.” All at once, Patty exploded into snow and fell apart.

“ _Shit,_ ” Foley exclaimed. He swatted at the snow falling around them with a gloved hand. “Do you reckon he’s still about?” 

“Who cares.” Ronnie glimpsed a building through the trees and realised that Patty had led them to Foley’s cabin. “It’s freezing out here. Let’s go inside.”


	6. Known

_Patty quietly knocked before coming in. “Grandma?”_

_“Patty?” she softly replied._

_He pulled up the chair beside her bed. “How are you?”_

_“Just a little tired, dear. Are you dressing up for something?”_

_“I’m going on a date tonight! Do you like my dress?” He flattened it out a little, making sure she could see it._

_She smiled warmly. “So pretty! But you must be so cold.”_

_Patty shook his head, holding her hand. “I have a coat downstairs. We’ll be indoors most of the night anyway, I won’t be cold at all.”_

_Grandma still seemed worried. “So cold. Always cold, even if you only feel it when the sun’s out.”_

_Patty frowned, but spotted the book on her bedside table. “Is that from a poem? What does it mean?”_

_“It’s so cold out there. You won’t feel warm for such a long time.”_


	7. Perplexed

“What are you doing?” 

Ronnie started, nearly dropping his rifle. “Jesus _Christ._ ” 

“No, it’s just me,” Patty replied, pulling up a chair at the table and fiddling with the shotgun Ronnie had just cleaned. 

Ronnie took it away from him, setting it down against the wall. “What are _you_ doing? Don’t you have murders to commit?” His stomach twisted with regret at how hurt Patty looked. 

“I don’t _like_ that I kill people.”

Ronnie went back to cleaning the rifle, pushing aside the sympathy. “Then stop.”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

Patty looked at his hands. “I have to do it. I don’t know if it’s a ghost thing, but every year I start feeling like I’m losing myself. Like I’m forgetting who I am. I start _needing_ to kill and it gets worse until I do. It’s terrifying.”

“You can’t horribly mutilate animals instead?”

“I already told you I hate needless killing. If I killed squirrels they would be wasted. I can’t even eat them.” 

“But people aren’t a waste?”

“Not if they’re hurting us.”

Ronnie started reassembling the rifle. “I heard about the guy you just killed on the news. They found another body near his remains.” 

Patty nodded. “He killed his niece a few months ago. He kept visiting the place he left her, so I waited for him nearby. Her parents thought she ran away. They should know what happened.” 

Ronnie heard a truck pull up in the driveway and put the rifle down. “That’s Ben. You should leave if you don’t want him to see you.” 

He went out, greeting Ben with a hug and helping him get the beers out of his truck. “How’ve you been?” 

“Busy with the recent attack,” he replied, making for the cabin, “I’m having to tell people we have it under control, but we have all the same dead ends as every other attack. Police are very interested in the other body, though. They’re saying it’s his niece and they think he killed her.” 

“No shit.” 

“Yeah. And if the animal hadn’t killed him in that spot they would never have found the body. Pretty weird, right?”

Ronnie opened the door, his reply dying in his throat when he saw Patty still seated at the table. 

“Woah, hi,” Ben said, “Didn’t know you were seeing anyone, Ronnie.”

“I’m...not…”

Ben put his case of beers on the table and shook Patty’s hand politely. “I’m Ben.”

“Patty,” Patty said, smiling. 

“Don’t...don’t talk to him,” Ronnie said to Patty. 

Ben looked surprised. “Hey, it’s okay mate. I won’t tell anyone if you’re keeping it low key at the moment.” 

“He’s dead, Ben.”

“Excuse me?”

“Dead as a rock,” Patty confirmed with a shrug.

“Stop talking." Ronnie turned to Ben. "Do you remember when we were talking about weird dreams we’ve had?” 

Ben frowned. “Um, vaguely?” 

“This is the guy I met. It wasn’t a dream.” 

Ben still didn’t seem convinced. “You aren’t having me on, are you?” 

Patty blew a few snowflakes into the air, watching them float down to the table and melt. “Pretty good prank, if he is. You should fall for it just so he can feel proud of himself.” 

“Shut up, Patty,” Ronnie warned. 

Patty ignored him. “If I’m still alive, how can I do this?” With a loud scrape, he pulled his leg out from under the table, revealing the bear trap clamped around his bloody leg. 

“ _Jesus._ ” 

Ronnie agreed. It was hard to get used to a sight like that. 

The trap and blood turned into snow and Patty shook it off. 

“Hey, I have to clean that up, asshole.” 

“Sorry.” 

"You better not have scratched my floorboards." 

Ben looked a bit sick. “I need to sit down.”


	8. Rent

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick warning for a bit of graphic violence in this chapter.

_“Oh, aren’t you precious!” Aunt Sal cooed as Patty returned to the living room. She’d joined Mom on the sofa with coffee._

_Patty smiled, taking a seat next to Mom._

_“When will she be here?” Mom asked._

_Patty glance at the clock on the wall. “In about half an hour, she said.”_

_“Do you want something to eat before you go?”_

_“We’re going out for dinner, Mom,” Patty reminded her, smiling._

_“I know, but what if you get hungry on the way?”_

_Patty hugged her tightly. “I’ll be fine.”_

_They were startled by Talia yelling down the hall._

_“No, what the_ fuck _is wrong with you? Why do you have them? MOM, DAD!”_

_“Talia?!” Dad called as he and Mom stood._

_Aunt Sal rolled her eyes, finishing her coffee and heading out the door to the kitchen._

_Talia’s scream chilled Patty to the bone. It was abruptly cut off, and something heavy hit the floor._

_Mom was the first to the door. She clasped a hand over her mouth. “Oh my god.”_

_Uncle John appeared at the doorway in front of her, covered in blood. Patty’s brain couldn’t make sense of the knife in Mom’s throat or the way she choked, falling to her knees._

_“Patty, go,” Dad urged, grabbing the poker from the fireplace and pushing him towards the door Aunt Sal had left through._

_Running into the kitchen, Patty clasped a hand over his mouth and fought back a scream. Aunt Sal was on her knees with her back to Patty, driving a knife into their maid, Tabitha’s chest over and over. He slipped out the back door, praying she wouldn’t notice him._

_The night was cold, but Patty barely registered the biting wind as he ran into the woods, sick to his stomach, mind racing as it tried to make sense of what just happened._


	9. Gentle

Ali took it oddly well. He told them that there were weirder things out in the woods than ghosts, to which Patty agreed, saying he’d seen some pretty fucked up trees. 

Ronnie slowly got used to Patty dropping by, accepting that he was eventually going to have a heart attack caused by Patty suddenly appearing in his living room, or his kitchen, or his shower, or the passenger seat of his goddamn truck right as he’s backing out of his driveway. Overall, he was sweet and mild-mannered. He seemed to like helping out around the house and talking about cool things he saw in the forest. He knew a lot of secluded spots that living people rarely saw. 

"Hey, we should go to the lake," Patty suggested one morning, helping Ronnie carry firewood inside. 

"Why?"

Patty shrugged. "It's pretty. And you never see it in winter."

Ronnie stacked the wood next to the fireplace. "That's because it's too cold to swim."

"We don't have to swim, we could just...look at it and hang out." 

"What if someone sees you?"

"There's nobody there right now and I know a really cool place they never go anyway."

Ronnie didn't have much to do today. Maybe it _would_ be fun to see the lake. 

"I guess we could drive down." 

Patty grinned. "I'll help you pack lunch." 

“You wanna help me pack lunch,” Ronnie deadpanned. 

“I haven’t made lunch in forever,” Patty said with a shrug. 

Ronnie guessed that one started to miss things like that when one had been dead a long time.

As they drove, Patty put on some music and sang along. Turned out they liked a lot of the same music. Once they were parked, they hiked for a while to find Patty’s spot. It wasn’t surprising that people rarely visited it, if Patty hadn’t been there guiding him, Ronnie would’ve gotten lost dozens of times on the way. 

Patty hadn’t lied about the lake being pretty this time of year. The dark water wasn’t quite frozen over and contrasted beautifully with the snowy trees. Everything was peacefully still, like it was all made of untouched glass. 

“Do you see that?”

Ronnie looked where Patty pointed. 

“A deer.” It was drinking from the lake a way off.

Patty grinned. “He’s a favourite of mine. He’s got a really curious personality.”

The deer looked up at them for a moment. Ronnie thought it might run, but it seemed more interested in them than scared. 

They found a place to sit and watched the deer in comfortable silence. It eventually started walking towards them. 

“Sit still,” Patty whispered, cold breath tickling Ronnie’s ear. 

Ronnie didn’t move a muscle as it came close, pausing to sniff the air. Patty took his hand and held it out for the deer. Almost holding his breath, Ronnie watched it close the distance between them to nuzzle his glove. It seemed to decide that they were safe, snuffling at Ronnie’s face contentedly. Satisfied, it wandered into the trees and disappeared. 

“Oh my god,” Ronnie breathed.

“Pretty cool, huh?”

“So animals are okay with you when you’re in your...human form?”

Patty shrugged. “They don’t mind me hanging out in it.” He gave Ronnie a sly smirk. “They know I’m not like other boys.”

Ronnie smiled at his hands. 

“You should eat,” Patty told him, standing up, “Don’t want you starving to death on me.”

“I don’t think living people need to eat as much as you think we do,” he replied. 

Maybe Patty was right, though. Although he’d had plenty of breakfast, Ronnie _was_ kinda hungry from all the walking. 

“I’m gonna go for a swim, okay?” Patty headed for the shore. 

Ronnie blushed a little when Patty’s dress suddenly turned into snow, leaving him in his briefs. He must’ve momentarily forgotten that Ronnie was there and just shed the dress out of habit. He tore his eyes away from the dimples in Patty’s lower back, making himself busy with his sandwich as Patty waded out. 

Occasionally, Patty would disappear under the surface for minutes at a time. Even though he knew Patty couldn’t die again, it was hard to not be just a little concerned. As he ate, Ronnie wondered if the spirits of drowned victims stayed in the lake and if Patty talked to them. 

After a particularly long dive, the snow beside Ronnie started to shift, startling him as it formed a humanoid shape. He relaxed again. Patty, back in his dress, sat up and smiled at him. 

“Sorry, I had to go check something.” 

“Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, a momma bear just had her cubs a couple of miles that way,” he pointed in a direction that Ronnie guessed was east, “I was worried, but they’re all doing okay now.” 

“So, when you’re not in your body you can just travel anywhere in the woods?”

Patty shrugged. “It’s kinda more like I _feel_ it all and I exist everywhere at once, but yeah, pretty much. The downside is that it’s just...harder to think when I’m like that. Like I have no physical brain to organise my thoughts.” 

“Huh.” Ronnie looked out at the lake, trying to imagine being everywhere in the forest at once. “Do you always keep track of births in the forest?” 

“Usually. It’s probably the best thing about being like this, getting to see so many new lives come into the world all the time. It’s amazing.” 

“It must be awful when anything dies out here.”

Patty tilted his head. “It’s sad, but it doesn’t usually get to me too much. Lots of things hunt to survive, you know? I just hate it when humans are disrespectful about the lives they take.” 

Ronnie nodded. He’d always found hunting trophies tasteless. Killing wasn’t something to proud of. 

Patty frowned, looking into the distance. “Hold on a sec.” He crumbled into snow. It wasn’t a moment before the snow flurried back into shape and Patty stood, holding out a hand to Ronnie. “We should go.”

Ronnie took it, standing up. “Why?” 

“Someone’s coming,” Patty said, picking up his pack and handing it to him. 

Ronnie slid the pack on, letting Patty take his hand and pull him into the trees. “Who? People?” 

“I’m not the only one who lives out here. Some of the others are...not good.” 

“Must be pretty bad if they can scare _you,_ ” Ronnie commented. 

“I’m more worried about you. Most of them can’t do anything permanent to me.” 

Most of them. Ronnie wondered about the ones that could.


	10. Cold

_Patty’s stomach dropped the moment he felt the cold metal plate under his foot. It took both an hour and half a heartbeat for the jaws of the bear trap to snap up and clamp around his leg._

_He didn’t even feel much pain at first, but as he collapsed into the snow and his brain caught up with it all he bit his tongue and begged whatever god was watching to not let him scream._

_If they didn’t catch him he could still make it. He couldn’t be too far from the cabin now, he’d be able to call for help over the radio there. Someone had to hear it and come._

_He pushed himself up, gasping and listening for the sounds of pursuit as he looked at the steel teeth buried in his leg. No one was following him yet, but he’d left clear tracks in the snow from the house to the woods. They’d only have to look outside and see them to know where he’d gone._

_He fumbled with the springs, his numbing hands sticking hopelessly to the icy metal. Fuck his uncle and his modified bear traps. It wasn’t enough to just trap intruders, apparently, they had to be punished for daring to trespass here._

_He shook violently and rubbed his shoulders, wishing that he’d had time to at least get a coat before escaping into the night. How long did he have?_

_He tried again to open the trap, but was met with the same sickening failure. It must’ve jammed. He shuffled over to the spikes holding the chain down, but his hands didn’t even have the dexterity to get a tight grip on them._

_Crying did nothing to get the trap loose, but it felt good. He let himself sob for a while, heart falling to pieces as he finally connected the dots between the knife and Mom’s throat._

_She was dead. Dad was probably dead. He’d heard his sister die. He wondered if they’d killed Grandma too. Maybe they’d forget about her, upstairs in her bed. She so rarely left it now. He wondered what would happen to her if her existence slipped their minds._

_Something moved in the underbrush, stilling Patty. He slowly laid down, barely feeling the cold now. Maybe they’d think he was already dead. He’d stopped shivering and congratulated himself for the self-control, ignoring the small voice that said he wasn’t controlling it._

_The sounds grew louder. He held his breath, watching the trees. Relief flooded him when a deer poked its head out. They hadn’t found him._

_He knew he should get back to opening the trap, but he didn’t want to move and scare the deer. It was such a pretty creature. The stars were pretty too. They were so clear tonight, billions of them glittering above him._

_It wasn’t all that cold. He could lay still just a little longer._


	11. Dreadful

“Do you show up in photos?” Ali asked, fiddling with a camera. 

“I don’t know,” Patty said curiously, “Nobody’s taken any of me since I died.” 

Before Ronnie could dive out of the way, Ali snapped a picture of them on the sofa. 

“Hey!” he said indignantly. 

Patty put an arm around him and squeezed his shoulder. “Don’t worry, dude, you’re beautiful!” 

Ali made a face at the camera. “Huh.” 

“How do I look?” Patty asked with a grin. 

Ali gave him the camera. “Dunno.”

Foley leaned over the back of the couch to see. “What the fuck.”

Ronnie silently agreed. _He_ looked surprised at having his picture taken, but Patty…in Patty’s place was a warped silvery-blue shape, slightly smeared around the edges. 

“Creepy,” Ben commented, smiling. 

“Let’s all take some together!” Patty suggested, “Come on!”

They huddled on and around the couch so Patty could take some photos, pulling faces even though the camera wouldn’t pick them up. 

After about a million, he gave the camera back. “Get these printed out!”

“I will,” Ali promised, grinning as he looked through the pictures. 

“That’s properly spooky,” Foley said, cuddling up to Patty, “Not showing up in photos, and all that. Very ghostly.” 

Patty grinned. “Do you guys wanna see my body?”

Ronnie‘s stomach twisted weirdly. 

“Is it still out there?” Ben asked, “Surely it’s just bones by now, if anything.” 

Oh. His _corpse._ Ronnie wasn’t sure why he was relieved, or why he found himself wondering if Patty had ever taken his dress off in front of the others too. He beat the thought back. It was none of his business. Patty could do what he wanted. 

Patty shook his head. “No, it’s still all there. Hasn’t really changed since I died. I go there when winter ends and I can’t make new vessels to walk around in.” 

“Why can’t you make vessels when winter ends?” Ben asked. 

“I need snow to do it,” Patty explained, “It’s weird, but the snow where my body is never melts anymore, so I stay there for most of the year.” 

“Huh.” Ben looked around at the others. “I mean, that definitely sounds worth seeing.”

“It’s a bit of a drive, you should all take food and water.” 

Once they had some supplies from Ronnie’s fridge packed, they piled into Ben’s car, Patty riding shotgun to give him directions. 

“Where is it, exactly?” Ronnie asked after a while. 

“Near the house I used to live in, up past O’Connor River.”

“There’s nothing past O’Connor River. Nobody lives out there.”

“Not anymore, but my family lived there for generations.”

Ronnie was sure he’d know if anyone had ever lived there before, but he let it go. “What happened?” 

“They died with me,” Patty said, as if it were obvious. 

“I’m sorry.”

Patty shrugged. “It’s okay. They can’t leave the house, but I still talk to them a lot. Take this next right.” 

A while later, a large house appeared ahead of them, much to Ronnie’s surprise. It didn’t look particularly rundown, either, almost as if it was still lived in. 

At Patty’s instruction, they parked up around the back. A sense of dread washed over Ronnie as they stepped out into the cold. It wasn’t hard to imagine that countless horrible things had happened in that house. 

To his relief, they didn’t stay there. Patty led them out into the trees, reassuring them that he disabled all the bear traps forever ago. They followed a single set of footprints through the snow. Patty’s? 

The place didn’t have any distinctive markers. It looked exactly like any other patch of snowy forest and if Patty wasn’t there to show them where it was, Ronnie doubted they’d ever be able to find it. There was nothing _to_ find aside from a small, familiar form curled up in the snow before them, leg stuck in some kind of sadistically modified bear trap. The same one Patty had been caught in the first night Ronnie met him. 

Unfortunately, Ronnie had seen a few hypothermia victims before. He never got used to how his stomach twisted when he was called out to help recover a body. The worst times were when they were just _so close_ to shelter and for days afterwards he thought about how nearly they survived and how different the world might’ve been if they had. 

This was different. He knew that Patty was a ghost and, therefore, had died at some point. He’d known it long enough that he could say he was used to the strangeness of the idea, and it wasn’t like Patty made any effort to act like he was alive. Despite that, there was something about seeing those milky eyes staring sightlessly at the clouds that just made it too real. It sickened Ronnie to think of how afraid Patty must have been that night. How alone he must have felt. 

He looked away, reminding himself that Patty was right there, laughingly commenting on how gross and weird his corpse looked. 

“So the snow here never melts?” Ben asked, crouching to get a closer look.

“Never,” Patty said. 

“You’re in pretty good condition. No signs of decay at all. I would’ve at least expected animals to have torn you apart.”

 _It._ That wasn’t Patty. Patty was talking to them. He was fine. 

Patty shrugged. “Animals don’t really come through here. I think it’s the house, they just know to stay away from it somehow.” 

Ronnie didn’t blame them. That place was fucked. 

“What were you doing out here?” Foley wondered, “You don’t even have shoes.” 

“I was trying to get to our cabin near the river. There’s a radio there, I was going to call for help.”

Ronnie frowned. “Weren’t the phones at your house working?”

“It was a weird night,” Patty said, sitting on the ground and looking at the body, “I had a date planned. My sister Talia went down to the basement to ask our uncle something. Nobody but our aunt and uncle were ever allowed down there and we all thought it was because they wanted privacy since their bedroom was down there. They never even let Tabitha, our maid, clean down there.” Patty exhaled, hugging his knees to his chest. “Turns out they had human bodies down there. Talia caught Uncle John cutting one up or something and she freaked out and he killed her. Then he killed Mom and Aunt Sal went to the kitchen to kill Tabitha and Dad told me to run.”

Anger stirred in Ronnie. What kind of fucked-up world let something like that happen to someone like Patty? 

“I was kinda cornered,” Patty continued, “I didn’t even have time to get a coat, I just ran outside and tried to get to the cabin. I didn’t follow the road because I thought John might figure out where I went and catch up to me. Then…” He gestured to the body on the ground. 

Ronnie could barely look at it. 

“People always talked about how that house made people go insane. A lot of people did fucked up shit there. Never thought it would happen to us, though.” 

“Do you want us to bury it?” Ronnie asked, nodding at the body. 

Patty looked surprised. “No, that’s okay. I don’t even know where I’d want it buried, and the ground’s frozen solid anyway.”

Ronnie let it go. Maybe Patty would figure out what he wanted done with it later. 

“I’m gonna say hi to Talia,” Patty said, “Do you guys wanna come?”

“Your sister?” Ali asked, “Where is she?” 

“Back at the house. Everyone’s still there, but...I don’t know, she’s the only one who still remembers anything. I don’t think anyone else even knows they died.” 

The journey back seemed to go by much faster, maybe because Ronnie was so glad to get away from the reminder of everything Patty had gone through. His unease returned as they approached the house, walking around to the front. 

“Wait here.” Patty walked up to the door and knocked. All was quiet for a moment, then it opened. 

A tired-looking girl answered it. 

“Hey!” Patty hugged her tightly for a moment. “Where are John and Sal?” 

“In the basement,” the girl answered. 

“Are Mom and Dad awake?”

The girl shrugged. 

Patty turned back to the others. “Come on! We’ll be fine for now. This is my sister, Talia!”


	12. Small

_He was falling. Falling too fast. Where was he? He could feel wind pulling at a million leaves all around him. Water crashing over rocks as an eagle dove and ripped a fish out of it. Birds chattered and took flight and pecked at fruit and Patty wished he could cover his ears against the terrifying hurricane of noise, but he couldn’t find his hands._

_A bullet tore into a deer’s neck. He watched the hunter put a knife in its throat and felt blood dribble out onto the dirt and fallen leaves. He wanted to scream, but his voice was gone, stolen, lost._

_Silently and with the souls of every living thing he felt scurrying about the forest, he pleaded for help._

_Something powerful reached out._

_Something dark promised him a way out._


	13. Soft

Although he knew that Patty would have to leave when spring came, Ronnie found it hard not to feel crushed. Patty had told him that his house was a high traffic area for all kinds of spirits and that it often wasn’t safe for living things, so he couldn’t just drive up to visit him whenever he wanted. 

Ronnie wondered what else there was out there. When he, Ali, Ben and Foley had met his family, Patty had been on edge, constantly checking the basement to make sure his aunt and uncle were still there. He’d later explained that the spirits of their victims usually kept them down there. They weren’t as powerful as Patty, but there were a lot of them, he said. Sometimes his aunt and uncle got out, though, enraged and bloodthirsty. Did others like them wander the woods? 

He had a grandmother, too, though he said she’d been sleeping ever since the rest of them died. Ronnie wondered what that meant for a ghost. Patty had told him that since he didn’t have a real body he didn’t sleep anymore. 

As spring became summer, it felt like winter’s weather would never come. What if it didn’t snow this time around? What if climate change finally caught up with them and he never saw Patty again? He’d always loved his cabin for the quiet peace it had, but now it felt cramped and lonely. 

Sometimes Ronnie thought he felt Patty. Maybe it was his imagination, but when the feeling came he liked to think that Patty had come by in his spirit form. Did it make him crazy to try to talk to him like this? To ask him how he was doing?

All through autumn, Ronnie followed weather reports religiously, wondering how much snow Patty needed to create a vessel. The first time he was out hunting and noticed tiny specks of white falling around him he stayed up all night, praying that it would be enough. He stayed up a lot of nights like that, waiting for Patty to arrive, but even when news of another grotesque “animal” killing came and the snow continued to pile up, he didn’t come. 

Ali asked him how he was when they ran into each other in town. 

“We’ve been missing you,” he said, “You been alright?”

“I’m fine.”

Ali didn’t seem to believe him, but he dropped it. “Have you seen Patty yet?”

Ronnie shook his head wordlessly. 

Ali looked around and leaned in. “They found another body,” he murmured.

“I know.”

“Honestly, if half of what they’re saying about the bodies they found with his is true, he deserved it.”

Ronnie looked at him, shocked. That wasn’t like Ali at all. 

He shrugged apologetically at Ronnie’s expression. “It’s just horrible to even think about what he did. I used to think I knew him.”

“Henderson?”

“Yeah.” 

Ronnie was at the end of his rope. When he got home, he could barely focus on putting the food he’d bought away. He went back outside to yell at the trees. Why not? He couldn’t think of any other way to get Patty’s attention. 

“Patty?” he shouted, watching for any sign of movement in the trees, “Patty!” 

Some snow on the ground in front of him stirred and rose, forming a humanoid shape. Patty sat up, looking sad. Ronnie felt his chest tighten. 

“What’s wrong?” he asked. 

“I killed someone,” Patty replied, looking at the ground as he stood, “Aren’t you angry? Or scared?”

“I heard about it. They found Henderson near a grave with two other bodies. People think he killed them.” 

Patty’s expression hardened. “I saw him do it. He found them camping on his property last summer and tortured them to death. It’s not the first time either. He’s been on my list for a while.” 

Patty had a list? Ronnie brushed the thought aside. “Come inside. Please.”

Patty quietly followed him in, taking a seat at the table. 

Ronnie sat opposite him. “I missed you,” he confessed. 

“I know. I’m sorry I didn’t come sooner, but...I didn’t trust myself. I needed to kill someone and I didn’t wanna hurt you.” He looked ashamed. 

“But you still didn’t come after Henderson.”

“I thought you’d hate me. You _should_ hate me.” 

“I couldn’t hate you.” 

Patty finally looked up at him. They were quiet for a moment, and Ronnie wondered if he’d said the wrong thing. Maybe they should talk about something else. 

“You wanna go somewhere? Like we used to?” 

“Sure.” 

Ronnie wondered if Patty thought it was weird that he had his hiking pack prepared already. Maybe he’d already seen Ronnie packing it as the weather cooled.

It didn’t take more than a few trips for Patty’s mood to lighten again. Was it presumptuous to think that he’d missed talking to Ronnie too? It didn’t matter. Everything finally felt like it was as it should’ve been. 

“There’s a place not far from here.” Patty said one day as Ronnie got changed into his hiking attire. “We won’t even need your truck to get there.”

Ronnie was sure he knew every inch of the woods around his house by now, but he didn’t say anything. Seeing it with Patty would be better anyway. 

Somehow, Patty took him to a place Ronnie couldn’t remember ever visiting before, a clearing near a cliff that overlooked miles of snowy woodland. They found a comfortable place to sit and take in the view. 

“I saw a really fat bear in spring,” Patty said conversationally.

“How big?” 

“Had to be like...as big as a small car.” He pointed to a mountain. “She’s over there this winter.” 

Ronnie smiled. “Do you ever give animals names?”

Patty tilted his head. “Uh...they have their own names, but...they’re more like impressions than words. It’s hard to describe, but as a spirit I kinda just _know_ who they are.”

“Do you know who I am?” 

Patty smiled at him. “You’re a good person.” 

Ronnie looked down, smiling and hoping Patty couldn’t tell that he was blushing. 

“God, I love this view.”

Ronnie looked back up at Patty. He must have seen this more times than he could count, but he looked as if he was seeing it for the first time ever. Ronnie didn’t think he’d ever seen anything more beautiful than the wonder on his face. 

He didn’t have a rational thought in his head when Patty looked back at him and he leaned in slowly, eyes slipping shut. 

Patty’s lips were cold, but so, so soft. Ronnie didn’t even move for a moment, he just let himself feel Patty and the racing of his own heart. 

As they pulled apart, Ronnie realised he felt kinda stuffy despite the chill of the wind. 

“Oh my god,” Patty murmured. 

“What?” 

“I think my heart almost did something.” 

Ronnie felt himself blush again, but he didn’t complain when Patty pulled him in for a deeper kiss. He could’ve stayed there forever, but eventually Patty said they should start back for the cabin before Ronnie got too cold.

“Can I ask you something...weird?” Patty asked as they walked.

“Sure.”

“It’s a long story but...Talia might not be dead.”

“How?” For the sake of her privacy, Ronnie had avoided looking too closely at her remains when Patty had invited him and the others into their house, but she’d been lying in the middle of the hallway and the blood coating her neck had been hard to miss. 

Patty shrugged. “My grandma—she’s alive too, but she’s sleeping—she did something that night. Some kind of spell, I guess. I think it’s why the snow never melts there. Why our bodies don’t decay.” 

“Can we help them?”

Patty looked grateful that he’d suggested it first. “I can break the spell and get everything moving again. I’ll get to try again.”

“Try again?”

“I’ll return to my body and try to finish that night properly. The way I wanted to.”

Ronnie’s heart nearly stopped. “You’ll be brought back to life?”

“Ron…” Patty hesitated. “I don’t know how it’ll work. It might only be temporary, just long enough to call for help.” 

Ronnie stopped walking and looked at Patty. “But we might actually be able to save you.” 

“I don’t want you to.”

Ronnie’s mind blanked. What?

“I mean…” Patty looked conflicted. “I want you to save Talia. If you try to come for me as well, she might run out of time. Maybe grandma too.” 

Ronnie’s legs suddenly felt weak. How could Patty tell him this and not expect him to want to save him? 

“The others could help,” he suggested, his mind racing, “I don’t think I could do anything for Talia anyway, but Ali’s as good as any EMT. Probably better.” 

Patty started walking again. “I guess we’ll ask them.”


	14. Hungry

_Patty looked at his hands. They looked like his, but there was something off about them. Was it just the lack of blood under the skin, or was it something else? Something in his gut telling him that this wasn’t his body..._

_He didn’t dwell on the thought. Something else was twisting inside him. An unfamiliar but deep, sickening need._

_Patty picked a direction and started walking, hoping to clear his head. He knew that the wind was freezing, but it felt more like the cold was inside him, mingling with that awful hunger._

_Keeping track of time was easier like this. He was aware of the sky getting lighter and, eventually, darker, though his body didn’t seem to notice. He didn’t ache or get tired, his bare feet didn’t hurt or bleed when he stepped on sharp rocks. The feeling of his body not being_ his _returned._

_He didn’t want to hurt anyone, despite what that dark feeling told him, but he didn’t know how long he could stand to exist like this. Like a ghost._


	15. Afraid

As Ronnie expected, Ali, Foley and Ben all wanted to help. Patty explained to them what he’d told Ronnie, putting a lot of emphasis on Talia being the priority. 

“I’m doing this for her,” he told them, “She deserves to get out of that house, nothing else matters. Especially not me.” 

“Ronnie’s right, though,” Ali argued, “If we take his and Ben’s cars, one could wait at your house while the other waits at your cabin. That’s where you were going, right? That’s where the radio is?” 

Patty surrendered. “Fine. But whoever goes to get Talia and grandma can’t wait for us. Go straight to a hospital.”

Ali nodded. “Of course.”

“So when are we doing this?” Ben asked. 

“Next full moon,” Patty said, “It’s about a fortnight away.” He looked at Ronnie. “Make sure you get enough sleep.” 

It wasn’t easy. Anxious thoughts of not being able to save Patty stuck in Ronnie’s mind like burrs. What if the hypothermia was too bad? What if Patty died again? What if Ronnie never saw him again?

Patty was here now, though. Ronnie could listen to him and hold him and sometimes even pretend that nothing was going to change, that they’d always have each other. 

“I love you,” Ronnie told him on the night before the full moon, “I need you to know that.” 

Patty looked over at him. Even though he didn’t sleep, he’d accepted Ronnie’s invitation to share his bed as long as there was a blanket between them. He always worried about Ronnie getting too cold. 

“Ronnie…”

Ronnie squeezed his eyes shut.

“I’m dead. And I kill people.”

“I know, but…” He looked at Patty, his chest tightening when he saw how sad he looked. “I love you. I don’t wanna lose you tomorrow.” 

Patty looked up at the ceiling. “I checked up on Talia today. She told me that if I don’t make it tomorrow she’ll kill me.”

Ronnie smiled. 

Patty rolled onto his side and put an arm around Ronnie. “I love you too.”

The hardest part was the waiting. Patty said that they had to do it at night, so they didn’t even have to start driving out to the house until late afternoon. Anxiety twisted in Ronnie’s gut, making him too sick to eat all day. 

When the time finally came, Patty went with Ronnie and Foley, Ben and Ali following close behind. For the whole journey Ronnie wanted to say something to him, but he didn’t know what. He couldn’t find the words to express everything that he was feeling.

The house was bathed in twilight by the time they reached it, and seeing it in such darkness did nothing to ease Ronnie’s anxiety. They drove past the house and headed for the road to the cabin, the other car stopping in front of the house, Ben and Ali ready to get Talia and Patty's grandmother the moment time started moving again. They continued in silence until they reached the cabin and parked, Ronnie taking out the set of warm clothes he’d brought for Patty

Once again, Patty led the way to his body. Night fell quickly as they walked, darkness blanketing everything beyond the feeble beams of their torches despite the full moon shining overhead. The journey from this direction seemed much shorter than last year's trek. He'd nearly made it before he stepped in the bear trap.

Like everything there, Patty’s body looked exactly the way it had when they saw it last year, no more decayed than if he’d died a few minutes ago. 

“You guys ready?” Patty asked, finally breaking the unnatural silence.

Ronnie glanced at Foley, who nodded with him, then swallowed the lump in his throat. “Go ahead.”

Patty crouched beside his body and reached out to touch its arm. Nothing happened. 

He sighed. “I think you guys have to go. You weren’t here that night, maybe that’s what’s messing things up.”

Ronnie’s stomach twisted. “Go?”

Patty looked up at him sadly. “Everything has to be how it was. At least here, where grandma froze everything.” 

Ronnie looked to Foley for backup, but he was silent. He shook himself and knelt next to Patty to pull him close and squeeze him tightly. “We’ll be just beyond the snow, okay?”

“Okay.”


	16. Home

_Something moved in the underbrush, stilling Patty. He slowly laid down, barely feeling the cold now. Maybe they’d think he was already dead. He’d stopped shivering and congratulated himself for the self-control, ignoring the small voice that said he wasn’t controlling it._

_The sounds grew louder. He held his breath, watching the trees. Relief flooded him when a deer poked its head out. They hadn’t found him._

_Tearing his eyes away from the deer, Patty pushed himself up and looked down at the bear trap. He couldn’t feel it anymore._

_Reaching down one last time, he pushed the lever down, almost sobbing in relief when something broke and the jaws came open and he was able to ease his leg out._

_With renewed resolve, he shakily stood and started hobbling. The cabin wasn’t far now. Patty found a long stick and used it to poke around the snow in front of him as he walked, feeling for more bear traps._

_He nearly burst into tears when he finally reached the cabin. He would’ve run if his leg wasn’t fucked up._

_Dad never locked the door. They lived so far from other people or any hiking trails that theft was unlikely, and he always said that the kind of person who would come across it accidentally was probably the kind of person who needed the supplies inside most._

_Patty shut the door behind him and took a moment to breathe before stumbling towards the gas heater and collapsing to his knees to turn it on. He almost felt like lying down right there on the floorboards and sleeping until the sun came up._

_The memory of Talia’s scream tore through his mind. He stood slowly and went to the radio._


	17. Responsive

Ronnie glanced at the silent radio again. “Something’s wrong. We have to go.” 

“Wait,” Foley said. 

“He could be _dead_.”

“He’s not.”

“How do you know?”

Foley shrugged helplessly. “We have to wait for him to radio us. We can’t fuck this up.” 

The radio crackled to life and Ronnie’s heart nearly jumped out of his chest. 

“ _Hello? This is Patrick Walters, I’m calling from my family’s cabin_.” 

Was it just the static or was Patty crying?

“Drive,” Ronnie said. 

Beside them, Ali’s car rumbled to life as well. 

“ _Something’s happened, John and Sal-_ “ Patty definitely sobbed just then. “ _They attacked us. I think Tabitha’s dead. Someone please help us. Over._ ”

Ronnie fumbled with the radio. “This is Ronnie Ish and Patrick Foley, we’re coming to get you. Over.”

“ _This is Ben Langford-Biss and Alistair Testo, we’re on our way to your family’s house. Over._ ”

“ _Please hurry. And be careful. Over._ ” 

“Walters,” Foley murmured, “How did we forget them?” 

“What?” 

“Mary Walters was Ben’s boss. Todd organised conservation fundraisers. The family lived in that fucked up house everyone said was haunted. Or cursed.” 

He was right, Ronnie realised. “They had two kids…” He’d _met_ Patty and Talia. He’d never been close with anyone in the family but years ago he’d known them all. 

He listened as Ben asked Patty for more information the way he would if he were answering any distress call. It felt weird to treat this like an ordinary emergency situation, but then again, they couldn’t risk doing anything to fuck up whatever power was at work tonight. 

Ahead of them, Ali’s car turned off the road and stopped in front of the house. If Patty was right, they should make it in time to save his sister and grandmother. Ronnie refused to acknowledge the tiny voice that wondered if he was wrong. 

When they reached the cabin, Ronnie didn’t even give Foley a chance to park before jumping out and sprinting to it. The door was ajar, encircled by a halo of warm light. He pushed it open, his eyes falling to the small form curled up in a blanket in front of a heater. 

“Patty?” His knees were weak as he numbly closed the door behind him and stumbled forward. 

Patty stirred and tried to sit up. 

Ronnie knelt beside him and took off his gloves. “Hey. It’s okay, I’m here now.” He put a hand to Patty’s forehead. “Just relax, okay? You’re gonna be fine.” 

“Grandma…” Patty mumbled weakly, “She’s still at home, you have to help her.”

“Ben and Ali are there, remember? They’re gonna get her and Talia.”

“Talia?” 

A gust of cold air hailed Foley’s entrance. 

“I have the first aid kit and clothes for him. Is he…”

Ronnie looked up at him. “He’s alive.”

“Thank god,” Foley sighed. He handed Ronnie the clothes. “I’ll wait in the car in case Ben and Ali radio in.”

“Okay. Patty, I need you to talk to me.”

Ronnie coaxed Patty’s leg out of the blanket, sucking in a breath when he got a good look at it. Up close and unfrozen, he could see how deep it was, even with all the blood seeping out. There was no way he could wash it while Patty was still so cold, so he took out a few bandages and started wrapping it up tightly, keeping Patty talking with trivial questions to make sure he wasn’t falling unconscious. 

As Patty warmed, Ronnie looked over him for signs of frostbite. His body had definitely had it when they saw it earlier, but whatever magic allowed him to come back seemed to have reversed those injuries. 

“Can you put this on for me?” Ronnie asked, handing Patty the large coat Foley had brought in. 

Patty sat up and took it, letting his blanket down just enough to put it on. Once he was dressed, Ronnie picked him up and carried him to the car, Foley coming out to open the back door for them. 

“Ben says they’ve got Talia and grandma. They’re heading back now.”

“Good,” Ronnie said, helping Patty into the car and following him in. He pulled his injured leg onto his lap to keep it elevated as Foley got back in and started driving. 

He waited until they’d passed the house, haunting and oppressive despite the bright lights in all the windows, to let himself breathe.


	18. Warm

_Patty couldn’t hold back his tears as he held Talia and grandma, aware of how close he came to losing them forever._

_They didn’t say anything. Talia couldn’t, since her vocal chords were damaged, though the doctors were optimistic that she would recover if she got plenty of rest._

_Patty couldn’t say anything either. Every time he tried, he just sobbed harder._

_That was okay, though. There would be plenty of time to say everything they needed to say later._

_They made it._


End file.
